Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan is shown in court Monday, June 25, 2018 in Houston holding a paper written in Arabic and colored with orange marker of the mantra, There is no god but God and Mohammad is Gods Prophet." Irsan was charged with capital murder because his alleged crime involved multiple victims  his daughters best friend, Gelareh Bagherzadeh, an Iranian medical student and activist, and his daughters husband, Coty Beavers, 28. Both slayings, authorities said, were driven by the anger of Irsan, a conservative Muslim, over his daughter Nesreens decision to marry Beavers, a Christian from Houston. ( Melissa Phillip / Houston Chronicle ) less

Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan is shown in court Monday, June 25, 2018 in Houston holding a paper written in Arabic and colored with orange marker of the mantra, There is no god but God and Mohammad is Gods ... more

Photo: Melissa Phillip, Staff / Houston Chronicle

Photo: Melissa Phillip, Staff / Houston Chronicle

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Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan is shown in court Monday, June 25, 2018 in Houston holding a paper written in Arabic and colored with orange marker of the mantra, There is no god but God and Mohammad is Gods Prophet." Irsan was charged with capital murder because his alleged crime involved multiple victims  his daughters best friend, Gelareh Bagherzadeh, an Iranian medical student and activist, and his daughters husband, Coty Beavers, 28. Both slayings, authorities said, were driven by the anger of Irsan, a conservative Muslim, over his daughter Nesreens decision to marry Beavers, a Christian from Houston. ( Melissa Phillip / Houston Chronicle ) less

Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan is shown in court Monday, June 25, 2018 in Houston holding a paper written in Arabic and colored with orange marker of the mantra, There is no god but God and Mohammad is Gods ... more

The 33-year-old nephew of a Jordanian immigrant facing the death penalty testified Thursday that his cousin confessed he committed murder and was one of three family members at the scene of the alleged “honor killing” that shocked Houston.

It was the strongest evidence yet tying Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan, a 60-year-old fervent Muslim with 12 children, to a pair of “honor killings” in 2012 that included the death of his own son-in-law.

Ahmed Garcia testified he was staying with Irsan when one of the patriarch’s adult sons told him about gunning down an Iranian woman near the Galleria area.

Irsan is on trial for capital murder in the shooting deaths of his daughter’s husband and her close female friend, Gelareh Bagherzadeh, a 30-year-old Iranian medical student and activist shot in the head in January 2012 outside a condominium.

Garcia testified he was at the family’s compound in rural Montgomery County in 2012 when Irsan’s adult son Nasim started laughing at a television newscast. It featured a Crime Stoppers reward for additional information about the circumstances of Bagherzadeh’s death.

“He was laughing and he said, ‘You know who killed her? I’m the one who killed her,’” Garcia testified.

Garcia told the jury that Nasim told him that he went to Houston with his father, Ali Irsan, and his father’s wife, Shmou Ali Alrawabdeh, to kill Bagherzadeh. When they arrived it was late at night and the activist was talking on her phone in her car outside her parent’s Galleria area townhouse.

Garcia testified Nasim told him he approached the car from the passenger side and shot Bagherzadeh. Evidence showed she was killed by a gunshot wound to the head caused by a shot from the right side of the car.

Nasim said after shooting the activist, he got back in the family’s Toyota Camry. Ali Irsan asked him if he did it, and Nasim replied that he had, Garcia said.

Nasim Irsan was later arrested for the crime and remains in the Harris County Jail on a charge of capital murder.

The nephew testified that Ali Irsan had been disgraced by his 23-year-old daughter Nesreen running away from home, converting to Christianity and marrying a Christian man.

Garcia said on the witness stand that there was only one way Irsan could have restored his honor.

“By washing it in blood … as in killing,” he said. “The results were intentional. They were going to be gone.”

Earlier, prosecutors told the jury Irsan plotted to kill his daughter as well but wanted to take the lives of the people close to her first so she would suffer more. Nesreen Irsan is alive and testified against her father earlier this week.

Defense denies it all

Defense lawyers for Irsan have said he had nothing to do with either slaying, and that no one really knows what happened in either case.

The twisted saga of alleged religious intolerance and violence has generated international news coverage since Ali Irsan was arrested and charged with capital murder.

Garcia, a citizen of both Spain and Jordan, said he spent months at the Irsan family’s compound in Montgomery County during intermittent visits between 2003 and 2012.

Garcia said Irsan had a “hatred list” that included his daughter Nesreen and the people who helped her run away from the compound and marry Coty Beavers, a Christian man from Spring.

“She would bring shame to the family if she ran away,” Garcia said. “It’s part of the culture; it’s different than the religion. Some people take it to the max — kill the person.”

Garcia was adamant that Irsan’s heritage, not his religion, drove him.

“There’s a difference between the culture (in Jordan) and the religion of Islam,” he said.

Garcia acknowledged on the stand that he was testifying to stay in America, where his children live. He was facing deportation after being convicted of domestic violence and invasion of privacy.

Now in the third week of testimony, jurors have heard extensive evidence about the January 2012 shooting of Bagherzadeh and the fatal shooting of Beavers 11 months later. He was shot to death inside the northwest Harris County apartment he shared with Nesreen Irsan.

Alleged confession

Garcia was familiar with the circumstances surrounding the first slaying and knew little about the second, except that Beavers and his brother and mother were on the alleged hit list. He said Bagherzadeh was added to the “hatred list” after Irsan called her to find out where Nesreen was living. The two got into a yelling argument when the activist told Irsan to leave his daughter alone.

“She was one of the people who helped Nesreen,” Garcia testified. “So, she was on the list. The hatred list.”

Garcia said he was out of town when Bagherzadeh was killed. “Whatever happened, happened after I left Texas,” he said.

Garcia testified that the Nasim Irsan’s confession came months after Bagherzadeh’s death, when he returned to Montgomery County.

Weeks after that, Garcia and Nasim Irsan were drinking together and tried to call in a CrimeStoppers tip that Cory Beavers, Coty Beaver’s twin brother, killed Bagherzadeh. When she was killed, she was dating Cory Beavers and had returned to Houston after leaving his house in Spring.

“He was bragging that he killed her, and he was going to frame Cory Beavers,” Garcia testified, adding that they never called in the tip.

Coty Beavers was killed in November 2012 by intruders at the northwest Harris County apartment he rented with Nesreen.

After Ali Irsan found out that Garcia knew the details of Bagherzadeh’s death, the uncle told his nephew, “You’re going to get us all in trouble.”

The trial, in state District Judge Jan Krocker’s court, is expected to last six to eight weeks.